There are many industries (e.g., home health care services, on-site maintenance and repair services, and the like) which require workers to travel to locations remote from a central office to carry out a particular task. For instance, the remote S locations could be locations around the state, county or city in which the central office site is located. Moreover, the remote location could merely be various locations around a large facility where the central office is located (e.g., rooms in a hospital, nursing home, factory, office complex, etc.). In many cases, there is a need to generate and/or receive information related to the task carried out at the remote location. The individual at the remote location (e.g., visiting nurse, home health aide, social worker, allied therapy professional, service technician, etc.) may need to access up-to-date or important information about a client (e.g., a patient or customer), or a device (e.g., an appliance), before beginning or completing a task. Moreover, the individual at the remote site may need to document tasks performed, test results, conditions observed, and other information pertinent to the task.
In the field of home health care, paper files have typically been used to record client information and document visits. Paper files have several serious drawbacks. In this regard, they are time consuming to generate, difficult to maintain, and easily corrupted. Moreover, they are often illegible, require the use of costly paper media, and are expensive and time consuming to duplicate.
While the use of a laptop computer or other handheld data entry device can reduce the reliance on paper documents, laptop computers and other handheld data entry devices pose their own problems when used in the field. Among these problems, they are costly to purchase and maintain. They also require the personnel in the field to have at least basic typing skills. Many people find typing more cumbersome and time consuming than handwriting. Laptop computers are also prone to theft and damage when used in the field. Furthermore, field personnel must be trained on the use of the computer and the associated software.
The present invention addresses the problems presented by both paper-based and entirely computer-based document information systems, as well as other drawbacks of the prior art.